Vanderbilt, Tennessee Tech show us how good college baseball can be

Tennessee Tech players watch from their dugout as Texas celebrates their win in an NCAA college super regional baseball game, Monday, June 11, 2018, in Austin, Texas. Texas won 5-2.

College baseball can look a lot like major league baseball, in part because some of the college stars we really start noticing each June soon will be playing at the highest level.

They won’t take their aluminum bats with them, but they will have seen pitchers with high-90s heat and vicious sliders. And superb defensive plays that robbed them of hits. The pitchers will have faced many worthwhile bats and they’ll all be prepared for long games with endless stoppages – over-prepared, actually.

The difference is in a moment like we saw Monday in the bottom of the seventh of the Super Regional final at Texas, a 5-2 Tennessee Tech loss that left the Golden Eagles a game short of the College World Series – less than 24 hours after Vanderbilt absorbed the same season-ending gut punch against Mississippi State. Tennessee Tech coach Matt Bragga went out to get star pitcher Ethan Roberts after Roberts threw 57 pitches in 3⅓ gutty relief innings, and Roberts was so upset about it that Bragga had to corral him from behind for a moment to calm him down.

The tears and swearing and hugging and glove throwing that ensued from Roberts separated this from a pro game, same as the scenes on three straight nights at Vanderbilt – a walk-off Mississippi State home run, a walk-off Vanderbilt home run, then the Bulldogs finally advancing to the CWS in 11 innings Sunday after two Vanderbilt homers erased a three-run deficit in the bottom of the ninth. Wild, memorable games and celebrations. A unique combination of high-level play and exuberant young people, without some of the galling contradictions of college revenue sports. (College baseball doesn't make much money, so it's OK to like it).

This is a sport, like NCAA softball, that has to scrounge for attention, deserves more and finishes with a captivating final event. The top two baseball programs in the state of Tennessee nearly occupied 25 percent of the field in Omaha, but even in defeat they created some thrills to help fill the beginning of our summer sports void.

“They can play professional baseball, but they won’t play in meaningful games like this, unless they go to the World Series themselves at the (major league) level,” Corbin told reporters after his young team came up just short. “These games right here have a lot of meaning to them. They are relevant to a lot of people. I just wish they would realize that about college baseball, that they won’t get this (type of experience) again.”

Tennessee Tech’ Brennon Kaleiwahea lays on the field after he grounded into the final out in the ninth inning of an NCAA college super regional baseball game against Texas, Monday, June 11, 2018, in Austin, Texas. Texas won 5-2.

Someone is going to jump all over a well-paid college coach, who has players lured away frequently by the pros, for saying something like that. And some did. But the scenes around these games tell you there’s truth in what Corbin said. And I can’t blame him for speaking up for college baseball.

This town could be preparing for a Stanley Cup Final Game 7 right now, or planning a parade, or looking wistfully at all the tweeted images of Alex Ovechkin guzzling booze out of the Cup after beating the Predators. And then how much would folks have noticed the postseason runs of Vanderbilt and Tennessee Tech baseball? The NBA Finals just ended; the World Cup is about to start; the NFL is always making headlines; and Nashville happens to have a red-hot pro soccer team as well. The window is small.

But if you watched these teams, you have to appreciate them. Corbin and Vanderbilt, of course, continue to load up on talent and will be back in Omaha before long. Bragga had a consistently superb program long before this season, but this team was extraordinary with its 28-game winning streak and NCAA-leading offense. The best in school and Ohio Valley Conference history.

Vanderbilt second baseman Ethan Paul (10) jumps on the plate to tie the game, 6-6, in the ninth inning at the NCAA Super Regional Sunday, June 10, 2018, at Hawkins Field in Nashville, Tenn.

Tennessee Tech’s total athletic budget is right around what Texas spends on a football recruiting barbecue, yet the Golden Eagles absolutely belonged on the field with the Longhorns. They’d fit in nicely in Omaha. They pushed to get there, emotions on display, until the end.

“It was very tough to go get Roberts because he is an absolute incredible pitcher, incredible young man,” Bragga told reporters after the game of that moment, explaining that Roberts’ velocity was fading. “He’s got too bright of a future to just ride him, you know?”

Roberts, a junior from Sparta, was one of eight Golden Eagles who just went in the draft, the highest-picked of the bunch in the fourth round by the Cubs. Some of these guys will fit in well in the pros, too. They don’t look in a rush to get there.

Reach Joe Rexrode at jrexrode@tennessean.com and follow him on Twitter @joerexrode.